Wedding bells will soon be ringing for Michelle Williams.
The Destiny’s Child singer is engaged to pastor and sports chaplain, Chad Johnson!
While the singer is over the moon to share that she will soon be walking down the aisle, the 37-year-old wasn’t always so forthcoming about sharing her joy and happiness–not even with those she’s closest to.
Revealing the details to PEOPLE, Williams had a feeling that there was something special about the 40-year-old, so she didn’t want to approach their relationship the way she had to others in the past.
“I didn’t even tell any people I was talking to Chad. I wanted to treat this relationship differently because obviously, all my past relationships have failed,” she admitted.
Williams said Johnson didn’t meet her friends–not even her former bandmates Beyoncé and Kelly Rowland–until they officially started dating in July.
“I didn’t want to talk about another relationship that possibly wasn’t gonna go anywhere.”
The couple met in March 2017 at a spiritual retreat run by Johnson. Although the Illinois native sought refuge in the experience to get over a bad breakup, she instead found another connection to God and a connection to her heart as well.
While on their first date at a wedding in the Dominican Republic, the two shared a kiss and took their relationship to the next level. Johnson said it was in that moment that he knew she was “the one.”
“I told her, ‘I’ve been looking. I don’t want to look anymore. I’m done. My search is over,'” he recalled.
Feeling comfortable enough to share her love with not only her friends but the world as well, there was something else Williams was ready to do in her relationship with Johnson–be called by her birth name.
“What kept drawing me and drawing me at first was I felt like I could be myself. My first name is Tenitra; my middle name is Michelle. I felt like I could be Tenitra: just ratchet, I didn’t have to have on any makeup if I had to have on my hair bonnet — he just made me feel very safe in being myself.”